Students Across the Country Tell PepsiCo: “We Won’t Work for Conflict Palm Oil”

posted by Kelsey Baker

PepsiCo Stands to Lose Out on Recruiting Top Millennial Talent

Every Fall, college and universities across the country welcome companies on their campuses to provide networking opportunities for students. These events can include career fairs, interviews, and industry specific networking gatherings. One such company is PepsiCo, major user of Conflict Palm Oil and top corporate laggard in Rainforest Action Network’s Snack Food 20.

PepsiCo is making an effort to appeal to Millennials and portray itself as a responsible, socially aware and sustainable company. This is evident in the company’s recent marketing efforts, including the relaunch of Crystal Pepsi, the throwback drink from the 90’s, this past summer (we let Pepsi know how we felt about that). But students have not been fooled by this propaganda.

“Pepsi’s palm oil supply chain is saturated with rainforest destruction, human rights and labor abuses, and species extinction,” said Adam Stackable, an Oklahoma student, “I won’t work for a company that uses Conflict Palm Oil.” Adam and several other students confronted a Pepsi recruiter at Oklahoma State University and delivered a letter urging the company to take action to address the egregious practices in its supply chain.

OSU students prepare to deliver a letter to a PepsiCo recruiter on campus.

Without a change, PepsiCo stands to lose out on recruiting top Millennial talent from the nation’s colleges and universities. Students at several other campuses, including Yale and Cal Poly San Luis Obispo have also disrupted various Pepsi recruitment events to deliver the same message: “We won’t work for rainforest destruction, climate change, human rights abuses or species extinction.”

Without a change, PepsiCo stands to lose out on recruiting top Millennial talent from the nation’s colleges and universities. Students at several other campuses, including Yale and Cal Poly San Luis Obispo have also disrupted various Pepsi recruitment events to deliver the same message: “We won’t work for rainforest destruction, climate change, human rights abuses or species extinction.”

Yale students disrupt a Pepsi networking event on campus.

“Students are letting Pepsi reps know that they are not welcome on these campuses,” said Kelsey Baker, Rainforest Action Network organizer. “Students are taking action to increase the pressure and push PepsiCo to take responsibility for its impact on the global climate, critically endangered species like the Sumatran orangutan and elephant, the rainforests, and the families who live and work there.”

Cal Poly San Luis Obispo students engage with a Pepsi recruiter on campus.

Poorly regulated, industrial-scale palm oil production, or Conflict Palm Oil, is a hugely extractive industry with little oversight. Conflict Palm Oil is connected to land grabbing, deforestation, habitat loss, species extinction, labor rights violations including forced and trafficked labor and child labor, human rights abuses, and more. PepsiCo must cut Conflict Palm Oil from its products, wherever they are sold. Until it does, students will continue to say, “We won’t work for Conflict Palm Oil!”